GraceMarie's Adventure Blog

I am currently procrastinating on my Capstone project... so I thought it would be a great time to write up another blog post. So for those of you that know me, you know that I am adopted. I'm South Korean, and my parents are clearly white. Unlike the movies, my adoption story is pretty tame. I feel like the media has kind of portrayed adoption in an unrealistic light, in order to get viewers. Now, I didn't go through the foster care system in the US, so I can't speak for that. But this blog post is more about my experience, and how it is a part of my identity today. I was adopted from South Korea when I was four months old. I'm from a little city right outside of Seoul (the capital of South Korea). My case worker, Marsha came over to get me from South Korea and I was greeted by my family at the airport in Phoenix, AZ. I have two siblings, one older brother Matthew, and one younger sister Samantha. All three of us are adopted from South Korea. All of us w...

Expectations Bang, bang. I'm reacting to the situation I'm making rash decisions Inside, my head is spinning Trying to recognize the thoughts being filtered through my subconscious. Tick, tick. A shiver runs down my spine Creating an uncomfortable sensation I'm starting to remember the things I've left behind Am I making the wrong decision? Would anyone bother to tell me if I was? Click, click. Sweat drips down my forehead I'm trying my best to focus on the task at hand. There's so much pressure Everyone is counting on me to finish it off But, the naysayers are lining up. Pop, pop. What if I don't live up to the expectations? I feel like I've been "trained my whole life" Clearly--if I fail, I didn't care enough I've been told that so many times I think I'm starting to believe it. Tweet, Tweet. I'm clearly not good enough--I don't care, right? But how can I foc...

  My dad and I got to go to Havasupai Falls last week. We spent 3 days and 2 nights in the canyon. This has been on my bucket list for a very long time, and I am so happy that timing worked out! We were lucky enough to snag the permits for this year. I heard that they sold out for the entire year in the first two hours! If you’re asking yourself: Hey, how do I go about planning a trip here? Permits? Etc? I will cover all of that in this blog post. So permits….every year, permits are released for Havasupai. They release 250 spots at the campground every day. They have the made process of getting permits slightly easier in that there is an online portal! Every year on February 2 nd , they release these permits. Luckily, I had my dad helping me on his computer when the permits were released. He was actually the one who got through to the page. I kept getting a “please refresh” page. I was honestly convinced that I was not going to get a permit, and even if I did I was not re...

So I stumbled upon this book because I follow Elan Gale and Molly Quinn on Instagram. Elan is a TV producer for the Bachelor and Molly was on the TV show Castle. Anyways.. This title really popped out to me, and I've been reading a lot of self-help/motivational/autobiographical books lately. So I thought that I'd give this book a shot. It was actually really cheap on amazon! It's currently 12.86 on amazon... here's a link: https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-That-Great-neither/dp/1478918292/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1519540614&sr=1-1&keywords=youre+not+that+great Anyways, I was really excited to read this. The book itself is not very long, and it's pretty small. There was a lot of interesting topics and suggestions within the book. There were a lot of relatable things in the book, and he kept a really sarcastic yet honest voice throughout. He talks a lot about the concept of rejecting "positive thinking". In fact, he basically says ...

 Washington D.C. was one of the stops on my epic road trip across the country last summer. While we only got to spend a day and a half here, I loved this city! It had always been on my bucket list, and it is definitely a place that I want to return to some day! Let's talk about the National Mall... that's where we spent most of our entire full day in DC. We just walked around! My feet were sore.. it probably wasn't the smartest idea to wear sandals but I was going more for fashion. But anyways..  I love how much DC has to offer! I love the history of our nation and it makes me swell with national pride whenever I think back to my visit. It is so inspiring to me that these monuments are of people and events that made a profound impact on America and the world. It would be so cool to live in DC and be able to walk around here all the time! I really wish that we had had more time! We didn't get to go into any of the museums. That would have taken all week (but next...

I'm literally so glad that we decided to buy this picture... I love it.  It's no secret. I LOVE roller coasters. Love them. The fact that I got to go to Cedar Point in Ohio this past summer was a dream come true. It was on a total whim, it happened to be on our way, and we went for it! I'm so glad we did. Those were the best roller coasters I've ever ridden in my entire life. It wasn't crowded, it was actually kind of cold that day! It was just my mom and I. We got there late morning and left around 4 or 5pm. It was the perfect day for roller coasters. Man did we have fun. If you guys ever get to go to Sandusky, Ohio.. GO TO CEDAR POINT. But only if you like roller coasters! This is an amusement park I would literally fly to Ohio just to go to again.

To give this post some context, I played collegiate golf for 4 years, at two institutions. I will graduate this upcoming May with my Master's in Criminology. Collegiate golf has provided me an opportunity to not only play the sport that I love but to obtain two degrees (Bachelor's and Master's) with no college debt. While my individual story in unique, there are a lot of tricks I've learned along the way that has helped me get to this point and I want to share this with you. If any of you are thinking about playing athletics in college, this would be the post for you (or if your children are thinking about it). Growing up, I was always involved in sports. From a young age, I was running around chasing a soccer ball, or teeing off on the golf course. When I got to high school I started to take sports more seriously. I wanted to play a sport in college. Sophomore year was around the time that I had decided to make it a goal to get an athletic scholarship to a universi...

So obviously the political climate especially in the US has been incredibly stressful (is that the right word)? Maybe a better word would be polarized? The fact is, many people believe that the country is in shambles. For the most part, people agree on this issue. However, they don't agree about the solution. Now, I will admit that I haven't been politically active all that long. I am 22 years old, and last year was the first time that I was legally old enough to vote for the president. Now, I voted in other elections that did not involve the president, but obviously that was a big election. I feel like I have been forced to involve myself in politics. In fact, I have found that it is nearly impossible to suppress my opinion when politics come up so often. It's funny though, I feel like most of my life I've been told that we shouldn't talk about the big three: money, religion, and politics. I absolutely disagree with this. I think a large problem is that we ...

Thought I'd offer a quick update on my life! I seem to be getting asked a lot about what I'm currently up to! I'm finishing up my degree this May. I will be graduating with a master's degree in criminology with a focus area in human behavior. I decided to take on the focus area of human behavior because I love learning about the minds of criminals and why people choose to do certain things while other people do not. I find it so sad that people do these horrendous things to others, but I find it interesting to study! I hope to contribute to my field someday with proactive policies that could lead to the decrease in victims overall. I think that the criminal justice system is very focused on reactive policies and care, which I think is great but I think a focus should be on proactive action. If we can deter people from committing crimes in the first place, we can reduce the victims. If we can show people what might make them a potential target, we can also reduce victi...

So yesterday I took Uber with some friends. We were getting dropped off at one of their houses after the Women's March in Denver. On our way back we started talking about politics and the death penalty came up. If you didn't already know, I am INCREDIBLY passionate and INFORMED about the death penalty and I think that we should ABOLISH the practice all together! Now, everyone is entitled to their opinions but the fact that our Uber DRIVER thought he knew more than me made me laugh. No offense, but I am getting my master's in criminology and have done numerous research papers on the death penalty so if you come at me with these arbitrary facts or try to correct my facts, that's really not going to go over well. It surprised me that a) he tried to discredit my facts by saying I was over-inflating, and b) was completely misinformed. He tried to convince me that it was cheaper to kill someone than to keep them alive. Now, while maybe people who aren't involved in ...